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ZOOLOGY OF BEECHEY's VOYAGE. 147 



written, we presume, some considerable time since, and is as follows : — 

 " In the following memoranda I have given such ohservations as I have 

 " been enabled to make on the animals of the various genera, brought home 

 " either by Captain Beechey's expedition, or by several other voyagers, as 

 " Captain Lord Byron, Mr. Fryer, and the Rev. Mr. Hennah, who about 

 " the same time touched at several parts of the world, which were also vis- 

 " ited by this expedition. I have been induced to follow this course, rather 

 " than to give only a description of the new species discovered by the offi- 

 " cers of the expedition, (as it was my intention to have done when first 

 " the specimens were put into my hands), because Mr. Sowerby and Mr. 

 " Broderip, almost immediately on the return of the expedition, described 

 "many of the new and interesting species discovered during the voyage, 

 " specimens of most of which were given to the Zoological Society by 

 "Lieutenant (now Captain) Belcher, one of the officers of Captain 

 " Beechey's ship. In my MSS. I had given names to most of the species, 

 " but I have since substituted those used by the above-mentioned gentle- 

 " men, that science might not be burthenedby the many useless names 

 " which an opposite course would have produced. 



" I have only given a zoological description of the animals ; as accord- 

 " ing to the rules of the British Museum, we are very properly forbidden 

 *" to dissect the animals under our charge, which might thereby be render- 

 " ed useless for subsequent observers." 



Any one at all conversant with Zoological etiquette, upon reading the 

 above extract, will not fail to detect a jlaw on the side of Sir William 

 Beechey. We can readily understand the annoyance it must have occa- 

 sioned Mr. Gray, to find himself anticipated in the describing the new 

 Testacea, brought home in the ' Blossom,' when he had commenced the 

 drawing up those descriptions himself. It may be. argued that Sir Wil- 

 liam Beechey could not be answerable for an officer of the ship's com- 

 pany, giving to the Zoological, or any other Society, specimens which 

 might be duplicates of those in his [Sir Wm. Beechey's] possession ; but 

 it should be borne in mind that the expedition was a Government aff'air, 

 and a sum of money being granted to put the public in possession of 

 the scientific results of that expedition, and the Malacological portion 

 of the Natural History department, being consigned to an officer in the 

 British Museum, an understanding surely ought to have been entered 

 into, by which the result just mentioned might have been guarded 

 against. Precisely the same thing might have happened with the novel- 

 ties in the other branches of Natural History, for there are plenty of 

 channels open to the speedy publication of the characters and proposed 

 names of new species ; and the respective authors of each separate sec- 



